I'm sort of OK with patriotism, as long as it's just loving and respecting your country, not more.

Please excuse me while I become a bit philosophical and trash idealism.

Patriotism is very much like religion. It's based on an idea of belonging to something. This ideology is part of the problem with society.

To put things into perspective. We're all human. We all come from Africa. We all have the same needs in life. In general, we're very much the same regardless of location, skin colour or culture.

We don't own anything, really. Ownership is really about possession. Possession comes from the antiquated part of our brain. It's attachment to things and our belief that it's important to us and the feelings associated to them.

These things are very much a part of our 'animal' heritage. It's the reason why we still have a patriarchal society. Why religion still reigns and why we still 'look up' to our so called 'betters'. These are all antiquated but tied to our genetic history and are still very much part of us.

As humans we've done everything possible to make divisions. We like this because it adapts well with our genetic history of being 'tribes' or 'groups'. We naturally form into them and we celebrate them and wear them like badges of honour. Whether it's being par of a culture, a religion, a nation, it all amounts to that underlining idea of being 'a part of something'.

It's not really a healthy state of being but it's one we have trouble escaping because it feels natural. We have old tied up feelings about things. Fear of the other. Fear of things being taken from us. Fear of... so on and so forth. These are all part of being in a 'tribe' mentality. A nation or country is nothing but a large tribe. Patriotism is nothing but belief in your tribe being special more than someone else's tribe.

It's arguable if one country is really better than another. Sure there are things about that country you may not like but from a societal perspective, most of the average people there really want nothing more than what you want.

We should be thinking globally and with a global mindset but two events so far this year has proven as humans we can't really deal with it. The UK referendum and now Trump being president. Two events that prove we're going into contraction and back to nationalistic thinking. We are retreating from being a global community. From a 'social media' perspective there will always be the whole world but there's a lot of people thinking now that they should care more about themselves and what's dear to them rather than what's best for everyone. This is the wrong direction but it was bound to happen.

Please excuse me while I become a bit philosophical and trash idealism.

Patriotism is very much like religion. It's based on an idea of belonging to something. This ideology is part of the problem with society.

To put things into perspective. We're all human. We all come from Africa. We all have the same needs in life. In general, we're very much the same regardless of location, skin colour or culture.

We don't own anything, really. Ownership is really about possession. Possession comes from the antiquated part of our brain. It's attachment to things and our belief that it's important to us and the feelings associated to them.

These things are very much a part of our 'animal' heritage. It's the reason why we still have a patriarchal society. Why religion still reigns and why we still 'look up' to our so called 'betters'. These are all antiquated but tied to our genetic history and are still very much part of us.

As humans we've done everything possible to make divisions. We like this because it adapts well with our genetic history of being 'tribes' or 'groups'. We naturally form into them and we celebrate them and wear them like badges of honour. Whether it's being par of a culture, a religion, a nation, it all amounts to that underlining idea of being 'a part of something'.

It's not really a healthy state of being but it's one we have trouble escaping because it feels natural. We have old tied up feelings about things. Fear of the other. Fear of things being taken from us. Fear of... so on and so forth. These are all part of being in a 'tribe' mentality. A nation or country is nothing but a large tribe. Patriotism is nothing but belief in your tribe being special more than someone else's tribe.

It's arguable if one country is really better than another. Sure there are things about that country you may not like but from a societal perspective, most of the average people there really want nothing more than what you want.

We should be thinking globally and with a global mindset but two events so far this year has proven as humans we can't really deal with it. The UK referendum and now Trump being president. Two events that prove we're going into contraction and back to nationalistic thinking. We are retreating from being a global community. From a 'social media' perspective there will always be the whole world but there's a lot of people thinking now that they should care more about themselves and what's dear to them rather than what's best for everyone. This is the wrong direction but it was bound to happen.

Anyway, that's my point of view. Some may disagree.

Do you listen to the StarTalk podcast? Neil deGrasse Tyson gave an excellent scientific explanation for tribalism in one of his podcasts.

I mostly agree with things you've said. I'd just add that I think that feeling that something belongs, or should belong to you actually is a natural feeling, rather than just our illusion.

Also, I don't think belonging and being a part of certain group is bad. That's how we survived right? Thr problem is when you limit yourself to one group only, and only pay attention to thay group's needs. Therefor, patriotism isn't bad to me, as long as it's loving and respecting your country, without seeing others as less worthy or inferior in compare to you.

Nationalism? Yup, we're going backwards, interesting things are about to happen, and it will become a nightmare if we all remain just a plain bystanders.

I will admit that I might be wring about many things, I am pretty young.

I mostly agree with things you've said. I'd just add that I think that feeling that something belongs, or should belong to you actually is a natural feeling, rather than just our illusion.

Also, I don't think belonging and being a part of certain group is bad. That's how we survived right? Thr problem is when you limit yourself to one group only, and only pay attention to thay group's needs. Therefor, patriotism isn't bad to me, as long as it's loving and respecting your country, without seeing others as less worthy or inferior in compare to you.

Nationalism? Yup, we're going backwards, interesting things are about to happen, and it will become a nightmare if we all remain just a plain bystanders.

I will admit that I might be wring about many things, I am pretty young.

Maybe I have a different perspective on patriotism than you do.

Also, I wasn't saying there's anything wrong with groups or being part of something, the issue comes about when that's more important to you than anything else. Which is typically what happens and where the idea of fanaticism comes from.

I also said belonging is natural. It's part of our genetic makeup and is one of the main reasons we survived and probably one of the main reasons why we are such complex organisms.

Group think and mob rule are horrible ways to conduct things, but that seems to be where we're heading.

Worse thing is America could go back to bush era .... Maybe? I'm trying to be positive and even in not sure if that's a positive

No this is going to be worse, much worse. The republicans have the house, senate and president for the first time in 90 years. If the republicans agree with most of what Trump wants, that's pretty much what's going to happen without opposition because there won't be any.

One Bosnian artist explained US elections in a quite interesting way. I'll do my best to translate. He says that all this time, every one of the previous candidates focused on empathy of those who are not in best financual state, who are not pleased with their job, wage, life in general. On those who are rocking the very bottom of our society. But their problem was the one that they tried to reach out to those who have not the right to vote, or are outside US, in simple words, they were paying too much attention to world, and the problems of the world. Unlike them, Trump did almost thr same thing, but adressed American fukara (the one who's on a margin), adressed Americans who are not your most educated men. He also calls them (in rough words), rednecks and scum of the nation.

No this is going to be worse, much worse. The republicans have the house, senate and president for the first time in 90 years. If the republicans agree with most of what Trump wants, that's pretty much what's going to happen without opposition because there won't be any.

America is screwed.

Make America great again.....just not for minorities, women , African Americans , Mexicans, middle eastern or anything in between :/

Also, I wasn't saying there's anything wrong with groups or being part of something, the issue comes about when that's more important to you than anything else. Which is typically what happens and where the idea of fanaticism comes from.

I also said belonging is natural. It's part of our genetic makeup and is one of the main reasons we survived and probably one of the main reasons why we are such complex organisms.

Group think and mob rule are horrible ways to conduct things, but that seems to be where we're heading.

Then we're on the same page. I have to say that all those things you've mentioned, we've had them for years here, and it's become a common thing, which is is just sad.

We are taught at an early age to organize things into groups. Schools teach comparing and contrasting in just about every subject. Looking for patterns in what we interact with is another learning strategy that is very important in today's educational world. Other animals do similar sorts of categorization. The green leaf tastes good, but the brown one tastes bad. So, putting things into groups based on certain characteristics is a tool that helps some organisms live, reproduce, survive, etc. Nationalism can be considered an extension of that. Now, in my opinion, categorization in the form of nationalism gets harmful when societal groups get caught up in a couple of psychological states:

Positive Distinctiveness - viewing a group that you belong to as being better than other groups. This leads to favoritism towards other members of your group over outsiders. Degrading people who are not members of your distinct group improves self esteem and positive feelings towards whichever distinct group a person belongs. Trump was a master at this. He routinely said things like "My people" "my uneducated masses" etc. Clinton actually helped him out when she called Trump's group "deplorables". She made them even more of a distinct group than Trump was making them.

Downward Comparisons - these happen when a group compares itself to other groups that it believes are of lesser value. This provides a positive feeling to the group because it convinces its members that they actually are better and they have the proof. They might say something like, "Well, at least I'm not from XYZ. It really sucks there, but not here. It's awesome here. Again, Trump was a master at this, too. He always touted his stance as being the savior of his group from all of the lesser groups intent on ruining America.

America is in the midst of exploring its shadow. Nasty, suppressed feelings and thoughts have been bubbling up for quite some time, now. This election has been the collective representation of what's behind a lot of closed doors, and it's rearing its ugly head in the forms positive of distinctiveness and downward comparison....erroneously called nationalism. Just my thoughts. Apologize up front if I offend anyone.